Mixed tech

I've been wondering lately. Due to the fact that it takes ages to analyze alien technology and that it takes decades before you get your first ship and centuries before you get a critical mass + you need at least 2 expansions (not counting your main base) to be able to constantly produce from mixed-tech yard, my question is:

Does anyone even use this outside single player?

Because every time I or any one I play with/against even gets the first or second ship out, he has already lost or won the game. The biggest mix-tech fleet I saw was 6 klingon refitted defiants, but at that time our team had 3 tactical cubes (and defiants were the only thing flying around).

A strategy I love to use is the saeihr spam, with the right allies it can do really well. You have to have a klingon ally, and it helps if an ally gives you 200-300 tritanium for the initial research. Once you have 2 moon pairs, you can spam saeihr from 2 MT yards plus rhienns from your staryard (you need phase plate rhienns to tank for the saeihrs)

The weakness of this strat is that all your ships are long ranged and relatively fragile, but if your klingon ally puts on a lot of pressure in the beginning you can get a pretty good critical mass. The damage that saeihrs put out is staggering, but their defense is crap so you have to be careful.

Also, the old federation-MT generix frigate was an excellent ship because it actually had a special. There are a few gems left in the Mixed-Tech lineup, but you're right that they're usually not worth the tech cost. Maybe if the yard could repair as well it would be more worth it.

No, the mixed tech research should be done at research stations just like researching your own technology and the vessels should be available at the standard yards.

Example (given tech) Federation with Romulan Ally:

- Starfleet Science can research stuff like cloak (or phase plates) and put it on ships with a small increase in build costs/time (increases exponentially with average offensive to defensive to system values). But each vessel can only be refitted with one additional technology (eg: you can't have a ship that cloaks and uses phase plates). - Starfleet Engineering has additional chassis research that supplements a given chassis level that costs a fraction of the original level and gives one extra ship per level. - No offensive or defensive boost is given with given technology.

Example (captured tech) Federation with Romulan Enemy:

- A special research station is built similar to the stock Borg tech assimilation facility, giving the same thing that you would get with given tech, but with extra specials. You would still only get one additional technology per ship (eg: a ship cannot be refitted to cloak and have quadcobalt torpedoes). - You can get a small offensive and defensive boost against the said enemies weapons.

Obviously, you'll benefit the most from having both an ally and an enemy of the same faction.

The Dominion Dreadnought is the only mixed-tech ship that can carry your fleet in a 2v2 game. In larger games, the Miranda II also has that potential. Cloaking Defiants are far and away the best raiders in the game, but you'll never have enough numbers to make a difference in a real fight.

Cloaky defiants are worth it in late team games just for their huge raiding power. They won't have huge cloak detect if your rom ally was focusing on raiding the other players.

In fleet battle they do what the leahval can do early game, take huge punishment yet still cloak away. If you can keep the micro good and not lose then then you have some nice tracks for sovvie/cube. Very useful but also situational.

i do have to admit i am partial to cloaked defiants, thats y i been lookin into like building rank 6 ships from the yard and fitting a romulan cloaking device to the defiant as std. i also think the dominion akira with that extra photon launcher are really handy esp for a wee felet patroling round your base to stop raiders. i think if ur in a protected position mixed tech can be really handy.

most ships that are good at raiding can stop raiders. monsoons are a great raider, and hence counter raider. the enemy wont see them coming for long as they are fast, and if the enemy tries cloaking you have proxy torps to at least make them pay for the raid.

The Ed'jen is also a great ship once you have it. Fast like a K'Vort, great weaponry(beam+pulse), very handy special and very cheap(special costs supply though). If you play Klingons, have a Fed ally and a 3v3+ game going - try it out. The Vor'cha and KVort you can get with this are great as well - the Vor'cha is better, cheaper and doesn't need an armory and the K'Vort is medium ranged.

Altogether there is high potential in mixed tech that is blocked right now due to the eternal research time.